


like a magnet you find me

by lady_liserator



Category: Runaways (TV 2017)
Genre: College AU, Enemies to Lovers, F/F, Roommates, Roommates to lovers, Sexual Tension, and there will be pining
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-09
Updated: 2020-01-09
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:41:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22189615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lady_liserator/pseuds/lady_liserator
Summary: The college AU I always needed.Nico and Karolina are freshmen at UCLA and they’re roommates who don’t get along (until they fall in love, of course).You know the drill: Enemies to lovers, Opposites attract, the works.
Relationships: Karolina Dean/Nico Minoru
Comments: 5
Kudos: 34





	like a magnet you find me

**Author's Note:**

> Small disclaimer: I have never been to UCLA (or LA at all, for that matter), so please forgive any geographical errors concerning campus or housing layouts.  
> I am, however, a student, so at least I know what that feels like.  
> Hope you enjoy this first chapter.  
> I know it is short and sweet, but there is more to come.

Nico has always loved being outside before sunrise.  
As long as she can think she’s been enthralled by the weird greenish blue tint everything has just before the sun comes up, the complete and utter eerie quiet during that time, and the freshness of the air just before the world wakes up again to pollute it with its smells and noises.

Those few minutes in the mornings when everything changes from greens and blues to purples and pinks have something magical, and Nico has always felt that it was the only time during the day where she can actually _breathe_.

So, as always when she particularly dreads the day that lies ahead of her, Nico is up early today, a duffel bag slung around her shoulder and a suitcase in her hand, as she gets out of her Uber and steps onto the UCLA main campus.  
It’s quiet still and almost completely dark as Nico makes her way across the stone paths which lead through freshly mown, well-trimmed lawns until she finds a bench that’s hidden behind a few trees, away from the main paths, and sits down.

Leaves rustling above her head and cool air calming down her heated mind, Nico stills, hugging her duffel bag to her chest, and resting her head on its uneven surface.  
She still can’t believe she is actually going to study here. That she is actually going to do this. UCLA, on-campus housing, majoring in literature; things she wouldn’t have dreamed of being able to do a year ago.  
And yet, here she is.  
About to be a _college girl_.

Nico laughs, a sarcastic snort, and closes her eyes to take a deep breath in time with the treetops above her. The light is already changing now, a soft purple curtain wafting over the greens and browns of the lawn before it gives way to the orange of the rising sun.

Just a few more minutes.  
Nico says it to herself as if she was a child unwilling to go to sleep.  
When she finally gets up from the bench to find a cup of coffee and the meeting point for the first welcome tour of the day, people are already filling up the campus, their early morning whispered conversations soon turning into the roar of a new day.

When Nico enters Dykstra hall a few hours later to find her room, she feels drained, the quiet start of her day already escaping her mind like a distant memory.  
Most of her energy had quickly been taken by a particularly spirited group of Sophmore guides during orientation, and there’s already countless other freshmen filling the halls, looking for their rooms, and the swell of voices and loud thuds coming from every direction is maddening.

Her first hours of the _college experience_ (her mother’s words, not hers) hadn’t been all bad, though.  
After orientation, Nico had wandered the lawns again, away from the main paths, and had found a nice shaded area of grass hidden away behind a few large trees where she had spent a blissful hour or two with her books and actually drinkable coffee from a nearby coffee cart.

Now, she wishes she had stayed there longer.

Her time in peace apparently hadn’t been enough to completely resolve her annoyance over the guides who had kept urging her and her fellow freshmen to “mingle, mingle, mingle”, and it is coming back quickly now as she tries to find her room.

Making her way across the hallway, Nico spots the door corresponding to the number on her key card quickly. A girl storms past her, followed by what seem to be her parents, whispering aggressively at each other, and Nico rolls her eyes.

Yup, having a shit-ton of people around at all times was going to be just perfect.

When Nico finally reaches her room, the second to last door on the left side of the long hallway, covered in left-over scraps of scotch tape, she halts for a second and presses her ear against it to see if there are any more arguing parents waiting for her in the room.

It seems quiet, however, and, praying that her roommate isn’t sitting on her bed already, silently enjoying the _college experience_ , Nico holds her breath as she opens the door carefully.  
With relief, she notices that the room is still empty, and, after a quick look back at the long hallway with way too many doors on each side separating her from the large entrance doors, she steps into the room and closes the door behind her.

Immediately, the jumble of loud voices mixed with the noise of suitcases being dragged across the floor dies down.  
Nico leans her back against the door and sighs as the universally depressing sight of an empty double dorm-room presents itself in front of her.

It had been a compromise.

Her parents would pay for her college, no questions asked, and she could study whatever she wanted, when in turn she’d come home at least once a month for Sunday dinner and would live on-campus in a double room.  
Nico had begged her parents, more than she’d care to admit, to let her live off-campus, away from the masses of college kids, but her mother had been adamant. Something about “learning how to be social”, making “good friends”, and really getting herself some of that infamous “college experience”.  
As if her parents really wanted her to do all the things that _that_ would entail.

Besides that, Nico is sure that were whole entire worlds between being “social” in college and sharing a room with a complete stranger.  
But here she is.

As Nico muses about why so many people outside seemed to have the need to shout loudly across the hall, there is loud thud against one of the walls against which the beds stand, mirroring each other, and Nico jumps.

After a second of finding the source of the noise and some annoyed huffing, Nico picks up the handle of the suitcase that had slipped her hand and glares angrily at the wall, as if it had produced the sound by itself.  
Immediately following the noise, there is a swell of cackling laughter and loud voices reaching her through the thin barrier between her room and her new evidently super-fun and super-loud neighbours, and Nico rolls her eyes.

“Fucking great”.

Nico mutters to herself, more annoyed than angry, while her eyes dart back and forth between the two beds, trying to discern any obvious advantages one might have over the other.  
After all, she is here first, so she has dibs on whichever bed she wants.  
Simple school trip rules.  
She decides on the bed that is not standing against the wall where the annoying cackle had come from, and sits down on it, earning a creak in response.

“Really fucking great”.

After tossing her suitcase on the floor in front of her, she places her duffel bag carefully on the bed and opens it, deciding that getting out some of her possessions might make her feel more at home.

Nico momentarily smiles to herself as she remembers Gert, her best friend from high school and future fellow UCLA student, explain to her the importance of making “spaces your own” while eagerly folding up her women’s march banner and carefully putting it in her suitcase next to her framed posters promoting various feminist causes.  
Nico loved Gert, she really did, but whoever would get her as a roommate would have a _time_.

But Gert was going to arrive two days later than Nico, and despite priding herself in her love for solitude, Nico finds herself wishing that she was here now, lecturing her about the importance of female solidarity and the “enriching experience of living with a roommate” to combat her swelling anxiety over who was going to move into this room with her.

But Gert’s parents, scattered as ever, had booked their family holiday overlapping with the first week of semester, and after days of pleading from her little sister, Gert had agreed to miss two days of college to go with them, and so Nico was on her own for now.

Slowly, Nico starts getting out a bunch of her books from the duffel-bag and places them on the night-stand next to her bed. She adds a small bedside lamp, a gift from her sister Amy and the closest thing she had to a security blanket, which she had carefully wrapped up in a scarf (also Amy’s) and feels the hint of a smile dance in the corner of her mouth as she examines her new decor.

It would do for now.

Biting the inside of her cheek, a nervous habit that she would never admit was caused by actual nervousness, Nico looks around the room once more.  
The sea of extremely bland furniture in various shades of beige is now only interrupted by the delicate black cedar wood lamp and the big leather-clad books on her nightstand, but she already feels a little better about the room.

The window lets in a perfect amount of direct sunlight, broken up by the leaves of a large tree that’s blocking the window, and the specs of light dancing across the floor almost make the room look pretty now.  
Almost.  
But the bed opposite her is still just _there_ , the headboard facing the same wall as hers, and they’re separated only by the window in the center of the wall, and to Nico, they seem entirely too close to each other.

Still, after Nico has filled one of the clothes racks with her clothing, transforming it into a big black block looming in the corner of the room, she can feel a weird notion of hopefulness rise up within her as she stands in her half of the room, which is starting to feel like exactly that- hers.  
Along with it, there’s a tiny wave of optimism washing over her, a rare occurrence, and for a second she entertains the thought that maybe, just maybe, this whole thing wasn’t going to be too bad.

And that, of course, is when the door opens.  
Nico’s calm is abruptly disrupted by the absurdly loud flood of sounds crashing into the room, and with it, a tall blonde girl with bright blue eyes and a huge smile on her face, followed by a small brigade of similarly tall blonde people, all talking over each other, and it brings Nico to the only logical conclusion.

_This was going to be annoying as hell._


End file.
